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Ridicule is effective in discussing the flaming hypocrites who hold power and ignore the rules they demand, demand, we follow.

I’m not great at sarcasm and ridicule. Takes lots of effort to gather the minimal ridicule you see on this blog. I certainly cannot generate as much humor as the loons we have in office.

Any smidgeon of humor I could muster is overshadowed by the hilarity of their dead-pan rationalizations.

(How do they hide the giggles such comments would cause? Only stand up comics have that level of skill.)

Yes, as you already guessed, I am talking about California Governor Gavin Newsom and Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti.

First, we had British Prime Minister Boris Johnson claiming he did not know the afterhours office parties with lots of drinking were a violation of the Covid rules that no more than two people could get together in private. His laughable excuse was nobody told him those drinking parties were a violation of the Covid rules that no more than two people could get together in private.

His defense is that as an experienced politician he lacked the intellectual capacity to apply the rules to scheduled, weekly, after-hours drinking parties. 

It has since emerged that two of the booze-it-up shindigs now under criminal investigation were in his private residence at 10 Downing Street.

I cannot make up ridicule stronger than just citing his comments.

And now!

Now we have Gov. Newsom and Mayor Garcetti. They are comedic geniuses. There is no way I can keep up with them.

They appeared in separate photos posted online by Magic Johnson. In one photo, Mayor Garcetti was joined by San Francisco Mayor London Breed. More photos have emerged showing Mr. Johnson with a variety of lesser elite elitists.

Of course, none of them were wearing a mask while at SoFi Stadium during the NFC championship game. Everyone at the stadium was required by both stadium rules and Los Angeles County rules to have a mask on every moment except when actively eating and drinking.

Their excuses? I could never dream up something as entertaining as their straight face explanations.

On 2/2/22, Deadline reported LA Mayor Garcetti Says He Held His Breath For Maskless Photo With Magic Johnson.

Yes, he held his breath for the mere two seconds it took to pose for the photo.

Lest you think these comments arise from my feeble sense of humor, here is the direct quote from the article:

“I’ll take personal responsibility,” said Garcetti in answer to a reporter’s question about the photos, “and if it makes you and everyone else happy — or even the photographs with people where literally I’m holding my breath for two seconds — I won’t even do that.”

Published reports do not indicate whether reporters in attendance started laughing.

Back to my feeble efforts at ridicule…

Yes, he used the “hold your breath during a selfie photo shoot” exception published in the Los Angeles County rules, California state rules, and SoFi Stadium rules.

This is a heretofor unknown exemption to the mask mandates in the state and county. Previously known exemptions are for “A-list” celebrities, state level elected officials, and senior staff in the public health sector.

Gov. Newsom also relied on this newly discovered “it’s okay if you are taking a selfie” exemption to justify not wearing a mask in the photo with Magic Johnson.

Article at Deadline quotes the governor during a press conference. Lots of other articles quote the comment.  Since you may still think I’m making all this up, here is a direct quote from the Deadline article:

“You’re correct,” he said when asked about going maskless at SoFi. “I was very judicious yesterday. Very judicious. You’ll see the photo that I did take, Magic was kind enough, generous enough, to ask me for a photograph and in my left hand’s the mask and I took the photo. The rest of the time I wore it as we all should, um — not when I had a glass of water — and I encourage everybody else to do so. And, uh, that’s it.”

There are only three little, teeny tiny issues in his rationalization, with said issues having been widely described across the Twitter world.

First, there is a video of him approaching Magic Johnson and sharing a hug, without a mask.

Second, there is a photo from the “FamCam” at SoFi stadium showing him seated with no drink, no food, no mask visible. Also, someone who is obviously not a member of his immediate family was sitting next to him, leaning toward him, also without a mask.

Third, in the photo with Mr. Johnson there is no mask visible in Gov. Newsom’s visible hand. Some wags have pointed out the photo may have been flipped and it was actually his right hand in the pic.  Only problem is the hand visible in the photo reveals a visible wedding ring.

So there are three separate reasons that rationalization flops.

I give up.

As an accountant I simply do not have the comedic creativity to play at the same level as the goofballs we have as political, business, social, media, and public health sector aristocratic overlords.


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